I read about zita-ajbridge:

http://kokkinizita.linuxaudio.org/linuxaudio/zita-ajbridge-doc/quickguide.html  

Set Jack to use its dummy driver, and then (in background) run zita-a2j for output and/or zita-j2a for input, and then ignore the 'system' input and output ports and use the Zita ports.  I went from 5.33ms to 1.33ms latency, and from occasional xruns to zero, and even with that my jackd usage percent is cut in half!  Shocking.  And that's three Yoshimis simultaneously.  :-)  I am tempted to giggle, but I am happier than that!!!  

The only partial catch was MIDI; without the ALSA driver for Jack, one does not have Jack MIDI :-)  Unless, of course, one uses a2jmidid, so that's what I'm doing.  With such a small Jack period, the extra period for a2jmidid is not an issue.

Just had to report, and congratulate, and thank, everyone involved!!!!!

Jonathan E. Brickman
Ponderworthy Music | jeb@ponderworthy.com
| (785)233-9977 | http://ponderworthy.com